Vertex Ventures, Sistema lead $30 Mn series C round in digital lender Kissht

Digital lending startup Kissht has raised around $30 million in its Series C round led by Singapore’s Vertex Ventures (SEA and India) and Russia’s Sistema Asia Fund.

The Mumbai-based fintech platform’s existing investors Fosun RZ Capital, Ventureast and Endiya Partners also participated in the round.

The fresh funding for Kissht comes after 10 months when Fosun led $10 million round in the startup with participation from Ventureast and Endiya Partners. It will deploy the risk capital to increase its omnichannel merchant base and ramp up its data analytics capabilities.

Kissht was started in the year 2015  by Krishnan Vishwanathan and Ranvir Singh, and it avails collateral-free loans to consumers to facilitate purchases such as mobiles, laptops, jewelry, and electronics.

Currently, Kissht is present in over 50 online and 3,500 offline points of sale across the aforementioned categories. The firm has partnered with Amazon, Flipkart, Luminous, Intex, Caratlane, MakeMyTrip and Uber, and others. 

Operating in 30 cities, Kissht aims to expand into 100-150 cities in the next five years. It disburses loans worth around Rs 60 crore every month and plans to double it to Rs 120 crore by March 2019 to become profitable.

Other startups operating in the segment are Quiklo, Zest Money, Faircent, KrazyBee, Creditmate, KrazyBee, Redcarpetup, and several others.

The development was first reported by Mint.